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Here, as an example of euphuistic composition, is Democles' address to the champions about to engage in single combat: Worthy mirrors of resolved magnanimitie, whose thoughts are above your fortunes, and your valour more than your revenewes, know that Bitches that puppie in hast bring forth blind whelpes; that there is no herbe sooner sprung up than the Spattarmia nor sooner fadeth; the fruits too soone ripe are quickly rotten; that deedes done in hast are repented at leisure: then, brave men in so weightie a cause,... deferre it some three daies, and then in solemn manner end the combat .
He endeavours to command Samela's affection by revealing to her his own identity, but Pleusidippus is beforehand with more drastic measures, and with the help of a few associates carries Samela off to a neighbouring castle, to which Democles and the shepherds, headed by Melicertus, proceed to lay siege.
Years pass on and Pleusidippus, who has risen to fame at court, hears of the beauty of the shepherdess of Arcadia, and must needs go to test the truth of the report himself. He does so, and promptly falls in love with his own mother. Nor is this all, for Democles equally hears of Samela's fame, and disguising himself as a shepherd falls in love with his own daughter.
Democles, king of Arcadia, has a daughter Sephistia, who contrary to his wishes has contracted a secret marriage with Maximus. When the birth of a son leads to discovery, Democles has them placed in an oarless boat and so cast adrift. The young mother has with her child Pleusidippus, but while still in early boyhood he is carried off by pirates and presented as a gift to the King of Thessaly.
A duel between father and son is unceremoniously interrupted by the inroad of Democles' soldiery. Upon this the identity of Samela is revealed by a convenient prophetess, and all ends happily. In the relation of verse and prose Greene's work differs from that of Sannazzaro and Sidney, the former being of considerably greater merit than the latter.
There is certainly nothing chivalric about King Democles, who, when some ten score shepherds are besieging a castle, sends to the 'General of his Forces, and not only has ten thousand men brought secretly and by night at three days' notice in itself a notable piece of strategy but when they arrive on the scene places furthermore the whole force in ambush!
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